Posted 2 years ago on Oct. 3, 2012, 3:05 p.m. EST by agkaiser
(1444)
from Fredericksburg, TX
This content is user submitted and not an official statement

"Concentration of wealth is harmful to Human culture and a threat to our survival. It's perhaps the greatest threat that civilization has always faced. Consider this analogy: In a hypothetical casino card game the house takes 5% of every pot. If 10% of the money at the table is on average played on each hand, then the house takes 0.5% of the money in the game on each rake. After 200 hands, 100% of the money that is on average at the table has been taken by the house. The only way the game may continue is to have new money come to it. The winners, of course, smell the new blood and even anticipate it greedily. And the biggest winner over a time is always the house. Until the free market ideologues took over, the biggest difference between a casino bank and finance was that the gaming house took a bigger cut of the handle."

36 Comments

When life was good 50 years ago, manufacturing was the biggest part of the economy.

Today, the "financial industry" is creating as muc [or more?] wealth than even the energy industry, but the problem is that the financial industry has no jobs for average people, and it produces NOTHING, it just shuffles money and paper around.

AlterNet has an article telling about where the wealthiest people make their money -
Quote:
In 1980, Only 9 percent were in finance while 15.5 percent came from manufacturing.
Today, 24% are in "finance" and 3.8% are in manufacturing.

I agree wholeheartedly. Pardon my quibble. Wealth is represented in trade by money. Money is not wealth and finance creates nothing. It's a parasitic appendage that harms real economy. It must be carried out, in as much as it is a necessary service, in a way that minimizes its cost to us. That is: of, by and for the people on a non profit basis. Banish the bankers and investors to Galtopia after taxing them to destitution. Let them restart their world from scratch and have no relations with them at all. They can suck off Ayn Rand's withered tit instead of our plentiful production.

The FED is a private non profit corporate bank, whose members are for profit banks and whose board is appointed by the President with the Senate's approval. Congress gave that corporation the power to mint money in our name. They are autonomous and the only control that can be exerted by the government is by appointment of board members. Congress asks them what to do. The presidents recommends actions but they have the power because weak kneed conservatives gave it to them.

The member banks borrow from the money the FED prints and loans it to US at a profit. We borrow our own money and pay the banksters interest on it. I think the rich are responsible for more suffering than all the tyrants and terrorists since the beginning of civilization. The latter, after all, are only the henchmen and overseers for the ruling elite capitalists.

Ironically, they see themselves as strong individuals and smart because, in unison and flock like, the idiot sheeple defer to the wisdom of their masters. The cons really are the greatest fools the Earth has ever known. Except for the cynical hypocrites. They're the liars who make fools of the rest, and drive them to hell like domestic animals.

Well I suppose things were not the same everywhere, and maybe I was too young to know how they were treated at work, but in my neck of the woods they were bringing home enough to cover the essentials for their families and own a house and see a doctor - but these days those jobs are gone.

Capitalism is plutocracy. Rule by the rich is a specific evil. Deport the capitalists to Galtopia, sans the capital. Let them show us how hard they can work to survive, starting from scratch, without us to work for them.

The acolytes of Ayn Rand and Milton Friedman want to be free from regulation by we inferior sorts. But they still expect us to work to produce the wealth they can appropriate with their Wall St scams, to support them on that fantasy island. "Sans Capital" is not in their reckoning. But then they only think they think, like they think they're hard working and think they're individuals who don't depend on us to work for them.

Yes! Thanks for that link. As G. Edward Griffin points out in The Creature from Jekyl Island, you can in fact create something from nothing. He refers to it as The Mandrake Mechanism. Fascinating! And you wonder why banks have close to zero as Capital Reserves.
To a related point. I posted info related to specifically how The One Percent is accumulating wealth in the 21st Century. They truly do get "something for nothing". Examine this info. Take a good look and you'll see exactly how over a trillion $$$ is being GIVEN to hundreds of thousands of Board Members for doing NOTHING but being part of the club. My post was directed at Baiin, but if you put the name or trading symbol of any public corp, you'll see that they're all the same. And what's amazing to me is that this is all right there on this website, but so few people understand it:
Inequality? “Makers vs. Takers”? Check this out: SECForm4.com It’s a site that allows you to track Trading Activity for Insiders. You know, Board Members like CEO’s, Directors, VP’s, etc. The data comes from the SEC's EDGAR database. Mostly traders use it. And there are other site out there like it. But when you see the $$$, you don’t have to be a trader to figure it out. When Romney began his run for President, I decided to look into his baby. You know, BAIN! Man oh man, talk about the “bane” of mankind? I've seen a lot of companies on this site, Bechtel, Halliburton, etc., but Bain is a whole different animal. Just do this: Go to http://www.secform4.com/insider-trading Type BAIN into the “Search by Company or Insider Name” box. Click “Search”. When your browser appears, click on the first link. When it takes you back to SECForm4, choose “All Data” in the top left box. Like I said, you don’t have to be a trader to understand what’s going on. Especially when you realize that all this $$$ is only taxed at 15%. Yup, that’s what they call CAPITAL GAINS! You know, what they want to drop down to 0%. Zero tax. NOTHING! But hey, I realize these people work really hard for this $$$. You know, Gifts, Awards, and Options. But really, when is enough enough? How about NOW? Bain happens to be Romney’s baby. He created it, along with their MO. But there are thousands of other Bains out there. Maybe not quite as bad, but take a look for yourself and you be the judge. Just plug in any public corporation’s name and see for yourself. Anyway, there’s a LOT more to this story. See if you can figure it out. Hint – think the 1%.

1 amendment to end corporate personhood & money is speech
2 limit campaign financing ( maybe $1000/person per candidate )
3 the 1% will not control our elected officials
4 the PEOPLE will elect and "own" the government

can you SPECIFICALLY state what problems cannot be solved with this approach - that 80% of Americans already say they want

Maybe, work to change the state ballot-access laws for third parties, in restrictive key states like Pennsylvania, Georgia, and North Carolina. In Pa, third party candidates have to get a ridiculous number of signatures in order to appear on the ballot, then can have their signatures challenged by Dems/Reps, and be forced to pay the legal fees of the challenger(s). That's brutal.

Actually, the problem is that the progressives got their way. Today's economy is based on that view. Regulation, central banking, taxation, wealth redistribution, & war. Too bad the real world has a habit of not cooperating with these utopian schemes. The 1% will always control the govt & the progressives handed them a big, powerful one to mess the 99% over with. Thank you, silly dreamers.